Scheduled Archive or Deletion of Email

[Matt Mencel <MR-Mencel@wiu.edu>]

Not so quick poll.  This conversation came up today here at WIU...we have been noticing it might be time to purchase more storage.



Does your university delete messages automatically after a certain period of time?

If so...

What is the time frame?

Do you only delete certain types of messages, or just attachments?

Do you keep compressed archives of old messages?

Do you allow the end user to decide if/when to archive their old messages before they are deleted.

What is your reasoning...do you do this because of FERPA/HIPPA/SOME_OTHER_LEGAL_ISSUE?


As far as what we currently do?  We store mail as long as the account is active.  The users can archive mail if they want but we don't currently provide an automated way for them to do this.  When users request quota bumps we send a message explaining how to find and delete large or unwanted attachments....and provide them a saved search folder of "has:attachment larger:5m" to help them out....only after they do that do we look at giving quota bumps.

When we remove expired/inactive accounts, we back up the mailbox and store the archive on disk for a certain period of time.


Thanks,
Matt